By Riley Zayas
Texas men’s basketball head coach Shaka Smart has to be feeling confident in the state of squad and the state of his job security 10 games in to the 2019-20 season. Why wouldn’t he? His team is on a roll, riding a five-game win streak, and off to the best start in the Smart era. For all those doubters at the beginning of the season, those who labeled him as a coach “on the hot seat” and predicted a demise this season, Smart has done just about everything he can to prove them wrong. He has silenced their insults, and now prepares to take his team to the great northeast — Providence, Rhode Island, to be exact — where the Longhorns will seek their fourth win over a Power Five program.
The Longhorns and [s2If current_user_can(access_s2member_level2)]Friars face off at 1 p.m. Saturday as part of the first Big East/Big 12 Battle in a game that can be viewed on Fox or heard on 104.9 the Horn.
The Friars, on the other hand, have not started their season as well as the Horns, and their schedule is proof. Losses to College of Charleston, Penn and Long Beach State put a damper on their non-conference slate, and they enter the Big 12/Big East showdown with a 6-6 record, still lacking a win over another major program.
Offense is Providence’s obvious weakness, and has been, throughout head coach Ed Cooley’s nine-year tenure. In the past two seasons, the Friars have finished 267th and 266th in the country in three-point shooting percentage, but that area of their game looks to be on the mend this season, as they’ve averaged 72.9 points per game so far.
Senior David Duke is a guy one of the Friars on whom the Longhorns will have to spend the most defensive effort. The do-it-all, 6-foot-5-inch guard is tied for the most threes on the team (18), has shot 42 percent from the field, averages nearly five rebounds per game and has forced 26 turnovers through 12 starts this season, while averaging 12.6 points per game, the second-highest scoring average on the team. Containing Duke will only be half the battle for the Horns, who will also be tasked with keeping up with 6-7 guard Alpha Diallo, the Friats’ leading scorer at 14.1 points per game, and UMass transfer Luwane Pipkins, who is scoring an average of 8.8 points per game.
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